


Not Her

by Lovelyloki



Category: Beauty and the Beast (1991), Beauty and the Beast (2017), Beauty and the Beast - All Media Types
Genre: Family, Father-Son Relationship, Mother-Son Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-31
Updated: 2017-03-31
Packaged: 2018-10-13 09:04:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10510608
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lovelyloki/pseuds/Lovelyloki
Summary: The explanation behind the torn painting in the castle.





	

In the Beast’s fury and shame, he tore up the family portraits that hung along the walls of his bedroom. He couldn’t stand seeing his smug, too-human face staring down at him, and why were there so many? He’d been so vainly proud of his looks. Much good it did him now. His claws ripped easily, far too easily through the canvas.

His father’s face, too, sneered at him condescendingly.

_“I told you, didn’t I, Adam? You’ll always be a failure. A failure of a son, a failure of a Prince, an utter disappointment to everyone around you.”_

The Beast (for he no longer deserved a name) wasn’t sure if the voice came from imagination or memory. Either way, it succeeded in fueling his rage.

He tore up his father’s face, shutting, shutting, **_shutting_**  that cruel mouth that never stopped spitting its judgments upon him.

He moved swiftly to mutilate the rest of the painting, but paused. His heavy paw trembled in the air.

Two blue eyes watched him gently, a secret smile playing on her lips.

 _“You may have your father’s face, but you have_ **my**   _eyes, Adam.”_

Her eyes. Did they still appear in the face of a Beast? He was too afraid to look, and he’d broken all the mirrors, besides. Except the enchanted one. He’d never, never touch it.

He gently rested the pad of one finger on his mother’s sweet face. The rough canvas contrasted with his memory of her soft, tanned skin. Skin darkened by their days in the sunlight; her laugh lines carved into her cheeks from their time of planting white Roses in her garden that Spring. His father had scoffed at it, and told the painter to make her pale as snow, as was the fashion.

She was paler in death.

The Beast blinked. His claws had begun to dig in her dress, and he hastily removed them. Not her. He’d not harm even her portrait. She was all that was good and pure in the world, and if she could only see him now…

She’d be ashamed of the Beast he’d become even before the Curse.


End file.
